


Even Altean healing pods didn't work on this kind of sickness...

by GunGun



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Anxiety, Gen, Homesick Lance (Voltron), References to Depression, Sorry Sharpshooter :(
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-27
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-07-03 05:40:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15812547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GunGun/pseuds/GunGun
Summary: Lance had cried when Spider-Man had ended up in space stuck to the rocket. Cried when their plan began to fell apart. He outright sobbed himself so sick, Hunk had to piggyback him out as they both left the theatre with wet eyes and sniffling noses.Besides the overwhelming sympathy, he didn't think he'd ever feel like Spider-Man was all that relatable.Until Voltron happened.





	Even Altean healing pods didn't work on this kind of sickness...

**Author's Note:**

> this is like a vent fic of sorts... been feelin SUPER bad so i had to channel it thru something— chosen medium: lance :( 
> 
> also my first voltron fic ever so be nice ehe... 
> 
> please be forewarned that i do describe symptoms of anxiety that deals with breathing problems (& anxiety that can domino into depression which is what lance is experiencing here).. please be careful if you think this might affect you, don't read it! 
> 
> ((prayer hands to lance.. i know dweamworks treats u like mierda... sorry for making u feel bad too!!!))

Lance can't quite recall when the feeling changed from a slow creeping drizzle to a mawkish wave that threatened to knock him off his feet if he stepped too close. 

The feeling had always been there.

He had been enrolled at the garrison afterall; in Nevada all the way across the nation from his dad's place in Florida and even further from his home with his mother and extended family in Cuba. They had enough money to fly him— and a couple of memorable times, Hunk— over every holiday they had off; but even those were only a temporary reprise from a cloying longing for his mother's hand on his brow or his stepfather's firm, warm hugs. His big sister Vero was at the garrison too, but with their vastly different schedules & curriculums, Lance didn't see much of her at all, if ever. 

He'd even take hearing his little cousins screaming and horsing around that often interrupted his late morning sleep over the early morning silences of roll call, stiff salutes, and uniform checks. It was so impersonal there. 

When he could find the time, phone calls would soothe a balm over the monsoon of negative feelings he'd experience after moments of consecutive failures and nightmarish nights... But they weren't as effective as a strong hug, a pressing kiss to his cheek, or a touch to his arm or shoulder for no reason at all. 

That first week out in space, on the castle and with Voltron; he'd been ecstatic. 

It was like something out of an anime or one of those YA novels he'd always tease Rachel for watching or reading; his near-identical-but-only-fraternal twin kicking up a fuss and forcing him out of her room. 

Fighting alien forces in space and liberating entire planets and species from the unyielding and cruel rule of the Galran Empire was almost fictional. Nearly unbelievable. 

(Lance could give his uncle a best seller right now; the author would probably be able to make it so much more fantastical than how they'd all experienced it. New berry Award here he comes.)

Then came the inevitable realization that— there was no definite date that they'd be going back. 

The Emperor of the Galran Empire, Zarkon, was a lot more formidable than he'd expected. He'd never taken Allura's warnings lightly, but it was a vast difference between hearing about how terrible someone was and genuinely experiencing that sort of ruthless treatment firsthand. 

After they beat him, who was to say there was no other evil lurking in the seemingly empty pockets of space? The universe was infinite... Across it, there could be just the same kind of villain like Zarkon... The same people being subjugated and murdered... 

Lance really regretted not having one last phone call or video chat that fateful night. He'd planned it, but his anxiety was out of control so he'd talked Hunk into sneaking out. If he knew they'd likely never return— he'd have taken more things that reminded him of home. Packed a bag, not of clothes, but of momentos. His phone— Who knew what the hell was possible in space? Lance would have visited one last time. Cherished the embraces of his family whom he loved so deeply and taken advantage of that fact. 

He'd had his wallet on him at least; that night they were swept off into adventurous space and unforeseeable peril. The pictures he crammed inside, now safely tucked away beneath the clothes in his dresser at the castle. When the feeling was only light, Lance would take them out and run shaking fingers over the figures in the polaroids. 

But when that sprinkle turned into sheets of cold loneliness that weighed him down like sopping wet clothes, he left the pictures alone. It would only ever drown him. 

Because there had been no distress calls lately, Allura granted them time to do what they liked as a sort of downtime in between the next inevitable and completely random alert. These days, they took whatever they could get. Lance was tinkering around in Blue, just checking up on things and spending some time talking to his lion. 

"What? How'd I never know we had first-aid kits in here?! This would have really helped that one time I nearly died on Planet Bullshit!"

There was a sense of ambiguity and a visual of his lion just shrugging at him. 

"Well, let's just act on the basis that I know nothing about the inside of an ancient robot space lion whatsoever— because I do not!— and from now on you tell me everything about you. Deal?"

Blue rumbled and he made his way over to a blank panel that he pushed. Like his lion said, there were emergency rations, emergency healing cubes, and— blood? 

"Um... Yuck. What? Is there space vampires now?" He asked rhetorically and sarcastically. 

A flash of a memory. 

"Space is getting more and more creepy the longer we stay out here."

He made a note to question Coran about the lifespan of packaged blood before he sighed, chest suddenly filling with heaviness like a big fat water balloon. Deep breaths felt impossible, but he wasn't hyperventilating. Lance coughed a couple of times and even pounded his chest, but air still felt shallow. Sharp sighs rasped out and he nearly broke a nail tearing off his chest plate— it just felt so heavy. 

A cape of sadness settled upon his shoulders and like a tragic knighting, a crown was placed upon his head forcing his chin to touch his space suit covered chest. For a moment he just sat there, slow breaths still feeling shallow for all that he felt like he was breathing deeply and properly. An ache began to pull behind his eyes. 

He wanted to think that this wave of sadness had come from out of left field... but it was only inevitable that it crashed over him at some time. Though it did have the effect of completely way-siding him while he thought he was busy enough. He should have known better than to think alone time with his telepathic lion, cataloging was enough to keep the feeling at bay. 

Loneliness. Homesickness. It was just so heavy. 

Soon enough, the rest of his armor joined the chest plate on the floor. God, was this the worst weight he'd felt in a while. He hated battling and fighting and getting injured, but at least he'd been distracted while fighting for the lives of his teammates and other planets. 

The thought that this could've happened during a battle nearly downed him, but he was able to shove that intrusive thought away before it overcame him. 

Lance forced himself up and lumbered over to the pilot seat, Blue rumbling to life beneath his touch and alighting the dim interior in aqua. The display flickered on and in seconds he was out into the vast glow of the atmosphere. 

He didn't venture further though. 

If he crossed that line, then he'd just be out in the deep black of space. Empty like the spaces in his heart; shaped just like his family. 

Staying within, he'd be able to see the stars and planets and galaxies shining through the haze of gasses to reflect off the tears in his eyes. 

He knew it wasn't here— the star he'd claimed as his own from childhood, dragging his mom to his window to point out the brightly shimmering dot in the night sky— but staring out at stars of similar brightness felt like enough sometimes. 

They weren't even close to the Milky Way. Otherwise, the war with the Galran Empire would have been that much more threatening.

Lance could honestly say he didn't have a clue as to where they were— he'd been avoiding looking at the projection of stars and planets with Coran lately. By another moon orbiting some planet, some-which-way in some quadrant of the universe— always so far from home. 

Floating in Blue and just staring out at the night sky was vaguely therapeutic. If he could imagine hard enough, he was back on earth and staring out his window at the starry skies. The shine from the moon bright enough to reflect off of the ocean waves. 

Barely a couple moments flowed by before it was interrupted. 

"— I repeat. Come in, Blue Paladin. Lance? Have you left the castle?"

Allura's regal tone fuzzed through to the speakers in the cabin and Lance peered behind him to see his helmet on the ground with his armor. He smoothed a hand over Blue's controls in thanks that he knew his lion felt and cleared his throat. 

"Yup. Just takin' this baby out for some bonding time!"

"Very well... Please do not fly out too far. And be safe." 

"You got it, Princess."

The comm shut off and he sighed, head falling back into the ergonomic seating of his pilot chair. 

Looking out the viewport wasn't helping. A lingering hopelessness forbade him to try harder; to look further into space; to think better of everything. 

His throat felt tight and every breath stung like the smell of freshly cut grass. 

The blue glow of the atmosphere he could see out of the corner of his eyes wasn't doing much either. It looked too much like Earth's. But it wasn't. 

If he got far enough away, Arus would probably look like Earth too. But it wasn't. 

The star that looked just as brightly yellow-orange as his own, wasn't his star. 

And as much as he pried and squinted and fought to find similarities between their ragtag group of space defenders and his family— it still wasn't them. 

 

It wasn't his ama. It wasn't his cousins and his uncle and his sisters or his grandparents. It wasn't his family. 

It was too similar and not similar enough and Lance bowed under the weight of it all and finally allowed himself to break the surface and fall beneath the overwhelming homesickness, alone with the gentle purring of his blue lion to soothe his hurt.


End file.
